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The Talking Dead
“'The Talking Dead'” is the ninth episode of the eleventh season of the ''Murdoch Mysteries'' and the one hundred-fifty-ninth of the series. It first aired on December 11, 2017. Summary After obituaries are published in advance of two men's deaths, Murdoch discovers more intended victims. A banker, a gambler, and a nun – while it sounds like the beginning of a joke, unfortunately it is a growing list of victims of fraudulent obituaries published in the Toronto Gazette before their actual deaths. After Crabtree and Higgins bring in a boxer and pawnbroker to join the nun, a mother and her daughter enter the Station House with a copy of the Gazette. Murdoch puts them all under a voluntary sequester to protect them while determining their connection to the murders of the banker Harrison McAllister and gambler Murray Gibson. Then, Detective Watts’ obituary appears in the new edition. Unexpectedly, the nun is killed in the Station House’s bullpen. Ogden finds a weighable quantity of a crystal alkaloid in the Sister Annamaria’s stomach and determines it to be strychnine, three milligrams in total, enough to kill a person quite rapidly. The murderer is now amongst them and the Station House is in lockdown. Meanwhile, Watts and Crabtree search the gambler Murray Gibson’s apartment and find money issued by the Dominion Bank - this connects Gibson to McAllister. Watts is reminded of an old case of his, a bank robbery: a customer was killed and the man he arrested was hanged for the crime, but there was an accomplice who was never found. According to the case file from Station House No. 1, the man arrested was named Joe Thackeray and he had previously been a bank teller. The tenuous connection that the Sister Annamaria banked at the same bank managed by Mr. McAllister leads Murdoch to surmise that Thackeray was the disgruntled ex-bank employee who was fired by McAllister due to Sister Annamaria's complaint and, a month later, robbed the bank along with Gibson. Crabtree then concludes that they need to find out if the others know this Joe Thackeray. He is the lynchpin to solving the case but given that he's been dead for six months he's not the killer. The team discovers that each and every victim of the fraudulent obituaries “''represents a rung in the ladder of Joe's downward descent taking him straight to the gallows''” – the sequential killer seeks vengeance. Character Revelations * Nina asks George to go to Paris with her; he thinks Paris is a veritable den of thieves and cutthroats and that The City of Lights is Buffalo. * George Crabtree prefers."...to love with the lights off", confessing that he is bashful to Watts. * Detective Watts tells Crabtree go to Paris today, for tomorrow he might die. * This episode presents a very different kind of criminal. * While the Inspector does not like the French, Thomas Brackenreid met a young woman named Céline in Paris: "Her name meant heaven. Oh, and by God, Crabtree, she took me to heaven and back on numerous occasions." Crabtree gets his time off. Continuity * The Toronto Gazette's obituary page is used as a calling card to murder and the Station House becomes a crime scene. * When Detective Watts’ obituary appears in the Gazette, his old case files from Station House One are fetched by a constable rather than himself as the Inspector reminds him, “ No one intends to get murdered and yet…” * Constable Higgins loses a suspect yet again. * If William and Julia are successful in their endeavors to have a child, "we must be sure to choose good godparents." George unknowingly enters on cue. * Eddie Crawford from previous episode returns. Historical References * This episode takes place in Toronto 1905 – the Edwardian Era (1901-1910) is the time when King Edward VII rules the British Empire; It is also known as the Belle Époque era, conventionally dated from the end of the Franco-Prussian War in 1871 to the outbreak of World War I in 1914. *The Moulin Rouge is the renowned Parisian dance hall of the late 19th century, famously captured by the nightclub's famous habitué Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Trivia * A handful of story seeds are planted in this episode by the MM Writers Room. * Showrunner Peter Mitchell revealed, "...bike riding scenes are hard as it is difficult to find any 'run' of usable heritage space in all of Southern Ontario (except if we go full-on rural). You'd be surprised how many ATM's there are." * Craig Brown as Eddie Crawford was first seen in Toronto's Girl Problem. * Hélène Joy wanted Julia and Murdoch to honeymoon in Paris, but they went to New York instead in Murdoch Takes Manhattan. Errors Cast Main Cast Yannick Bisson as Detective William Murdoch Hélène Joy as Dr. Julia Ogden Thomas Craig as Inspector Thomas Brackenreid Jonny Harris as Constable George Crabtree Recurring Cast Daniel Maslany as Detective Watts Lachlan Murdoch as Constable Henry Higgins Charles Vandervaart as John Brackenreid Shanice Banton as Violet Hart Erin Agostino as Nina Bloom Craig Brown as Eddie Crawford Guest Cast Madison Brydges as Agnes Swift Krystin Pellerin as Virginia Swift Nancy Beatty as Sister Annamaria Jay Reso as Leonard Stoker Angela Besharah as Dorothy McAllister Kevin Hare as Harrison McAllister Ian Rayburn as Driver Lauren Spring as Angry Weeping Woman John Connolly as Weight Guesser Uncredited Cast Nathan Hoppe as Constable McNabb Gallery 1109 Scene of a Crime 1.png|Scene of a crime 1109 The Talking Dead morgue 7.png|City Morgue: comparing obituary victims 1109 The Talking Dead morgue 8.png|Gibson joins McAllister 1109 The Talking Dead Victims .png|Other victims at Station House Four 1109 Toronto Gazette.png|Toronto Gazette 1109 The Talking Dead Crime Scene 2.png|Crime scene; victim #3 1109 The Taking Dead Blackboard.png|At the Blackboard 1109 The Talking Dead Joe Thackeray.png|Joe Thackeray, lynchpin|link=Blackboard Category:Season Eleven